The 2019 Dakar Rally is going to kick off in a few weeks. Aleš Loprais, his Spanish navigator Ferran Marco Alcayna, and chief mechanic Petr Pokora will set about a rally raid on January 6 in Lima. The racing team has to go through 10 stages in the truck category.

The team had been fine-tuning their Tatra at the workshop in the town of Frenštát pod Radhoštěm until the departure. Eventually, InstaForex Loprais Team left for Le Havre, France, to arrange some administrative formalities. There, they will embark on board a ship to sail to Peru.

“If we had been given one more week for preparations, we would be still working on the car as there is always something to do. The development of our racing Tatra is our everyday routine and it’s a long-term process. While our fleet is heading to America, I’ve moved to Dubai to practise in the sand dunes until the end of the month as Dakar Rally organisers are promising about 70 per cent of sand.”

Aleš Loprais debuted at the Dakar rally in 2006 as a navigator for his famous uncle. Since then, Aleš has not missed a single rally. On the whole, he has participated in 12 Dakar races, won 9 stages, and finished 5 times in overall TOP 10. In early January, the Tatra truck of InstaForex Loprais Team bearing number 507 will face the racing challenge.